All the Other Acronyms
by scousemuz1k
Summary: Yeah, yeah, amnesiac Tony, been done before... lots of times... I'm just a li'l ole bandwagon jumper. It's such a lovely bandwagon!   T for the odd naughty word.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: Was going to be a one-shot, as usual…**

All the Other Acronyms

by scousemuz1k

He knew he was a federal agent, because the silver haired guy had told him so, and he hadn't any particular reason to doubt him… He knew his name was Tony because people kept saying it to him, with looks of puppy-dog pleading, as if the oftener they said it, the sooner he'd remember. He knew he'd been hurt, because of, among other things, the drain stuck in his back, which had snagged painfully when he moved. They'd taken it out yesterday afternoon before he went down for the prescribed tests, along with all the other paraphernalia, and got him up to walk round his room a little. It was, Doctor Blamire had told him, the only thing he could do right now to give him a semblance of control back in a life that he felt was running away from him. He'd been grateful for the understanding, even if he hadn't been particularly demonstrative about it.

He knew that he'd been ill because of the injuries; again the silver haired guy, Gibbs, had told him so…. Apparently his lungs worked just fine when he was well, but were always at risk if he wasn't, because of the pneumonic plague he'd once had. It was at that point that he'd started to believe the man, because nobody could make up a stupid story like that. It had to be true. So he wasn't some international spy being interrogated in some weird way, like in some movie.

He knew what real spies did, or he thought he probably did; he felt as if he'd maybe run up against one or two sometime. He knew what pneumonic plague was; he knew what a federal agent was. He'd heard of NCIS, like all the other acronyms, and he knew they – or he – didn't like the feebies. The FBI. The alphabet soup. As he flexed his hands and imagined one, he knew he was at ease with a handgun. He was clearly right-handed.

He was a Senior Field Agent, an SFA…here we go with the acronyms again… He knew what else that one stood for, and it was precisely what he could remember just now.

He could speak Spanish and Italian, and not mix the two up. He was pretty certain he wasn't married.

He believed that all these nice people who kept visiting and being nice to him, saying nice things, and bringing him nice things, and being hurt but nicely patient when he wasn't nice back, were his friends. They said they were, and they were making such an effort, taking such care, walking on eggshells round him, wanting him to remember, willing him to remember, and they absolutely hadn't a fucking clue what it was like _not _to remember.

He sagged back against the pile of pillows… His life had begun yesterday morning, when he'd opened his eyes to harsh lights and pain, and a voice at his side that had said, "DiNozzo! You with us?"

Who the hell was that? And who the hell was he?

The silver haired guy had told him not to worry, shooed a lot of other people out of the room and fetched the doctor. Who had shooed him right after them.

_They'd settled that he'd be called Tony, since he had to be called something. _

"_When you were admitted, Tony, you had a fever of 103 degrees, three highly infected wounds including a deep knife wound in your back, multiple other cuts and bruises, cracked ribs and sternum, blood loss, dehydration, and no doubt hunger and exhaustion, although they're not so easy to diagnose on a patient who's deeply unconscious. There would have been shock to contend with when you were first injured, and you'd had a bang on the head, although I can't say that was immediately responsible for the memory loss, since when you radioed for help, you knew who you were at that point."_

"_I don't remember a radio."_

"_No… I think the amnesia is down to a contribution from all of these factors – "_

"_How long will it last?"_

_The doctor looked sympathetic. "I wish I had a foolproof way of telling, Tony. I'm sure –"_

"_Is there a chance I'll never remember?"_

_Dr. Blamire's hesitation had been tiny, but the injured man saw it anyway, so the physician's next words didn't carry the weight that they should have done somehow._

"_I've never known a patient personally who didn't regain at least some of the lost memories over time," he said truthfully, hoping that was enough to reassure. "I'll arrange for a cat scan later to see if there's any swelling that needs to reduce; that'll give us some more information. We'll do an MRI as well, it can't hurt to have as much information as possible. The best advice I can give you is, try to stay calm, even though that must be very difficult right now. I can prescribe a mild sedative if that would help."_

_The patient shook his head hard, then winced. "No…" he said firmly. "I need to think…"_

They hadn't let anyone see him for the rest of the day; it had been his wish. He'd recalled the crowd that was in his room when he woke up, and he knew he couldn'thandle them just then. The MRI had been noisy, the cat scan disorientating, and although he appreciated that he was getting the best treatment possible, his mood swung between fearful and frantic. In the evening he'd had to relent; the thinking, punctuated by fitful dozing interrupted by the hissing of the BiPAP, was that what it was called… another bloody acronym… had brought nothing of any help, and much frustration; and the nurses were beginning to give him reproving looks behind Dr. Blamire's back. They should try lying where he was.

"Your friends have been waiting all day to see you," Nurse Dawn told him in that sweet tone people reserved for recalcitrant children. He wanted to yell, _I haven't any friends,_ but he wasn't a child, recalcitrant or otherwise, so he'd pushed himself up in the bed and put a brave face on it.

These people, his friends, right… their reactions had been so different, yet all the same. He must know them, right… because he could predict, after one look at each of them, how they were going to handle the problem. As if _he _wasn't the one who had the said problem in the first place.

The young guy… slightly wary, introduced himself with his surname.

"Hey, Tony. I'm McGee." He lifted his hand to offer it, thought better of the idea, then braved it anyway. Tony shook politely, knowing that there was something about _him_ that made the younger man nervous. He wasn't sure he liked that thought; but there was nothing he could do about it right now… nothing he could do about anything, really – he was less than twenty-four hours old.

"Hi, McGee." He tried to feel some recognition, he really did… his gut told him the young man would overcompensate for his nerves by talking too much… he was looking at him hopefully, and the others were watching intently. The goldfish bowl sensation was horrible; he felt bile rising in his throat, and had to swallow down on it, struggling to stay calm.

"I er… you left your cell phone on when you dropped it… out on the mountain… that was good, because it got us to the area in time to help you when you called. You er.. you don't remember… but I'm the IT guy… I tracked you."

"I… er… right, thanks for that, McGee." He was sincere; he tried to sound sincere, but the younger man backed off, looking disappointed. The other two people who'd stepped into the room with him came one each side of his bed, the elderly man stopping briefly to study the information on the chart at the foot. The woman, meanwhile, gave the injured man a smile that was almost proprietary, which didn't surprise him, but did seem to nettle him slightly. She was going to lecture him.

She sat down on the edge of his bed and purred. "So, Tony… it was a good joke, but it is time to end it now, yes?"

Joke? He didn't know what to say. The young guy was nervous of him, and the exotic lady was suggesting that he was the sort who'd play amnesiac, and keep his friends sitting outside his room waiting for a whole day. He went cold inside with revulsion, and again he was fighting down the nausea. This was bad. If he _did_ get his memory back, would he like him? He really didn't sound like a good guy…

The young woman's beautiful, imperious face creased in a frown as she read his expression. "You really do not remember me?" There was still a hint of disbelief in her tone and more than a hint of annoyance.

"No… I'm sorry." He attempted to sound placating, but thought that not much other than tiredness actually emerged.

The short, elderly gentleman who'd been looking at his medical information soothed gently. "Now, Ziva, you really mustn't tease Tony, he doesn't need it right now. I'm Ducky," he added, turning to the patient. "Doctor Mallard, the ME at NCIS." He looked wisely down at him. Medical Examiner, the younger man thought, putting in the capital letters. Acronyms, bloody acronyms… was it only an acronym when it made a word? The doctor was winding up for a long speech, he knew somehow, and prayed that he could concentrate long enough to take it all in. "Your vital signs are improving all the time, dear boy, which is excellent. I don't doubt that as you get better, so your memory will improve. I don't want you to worry about anything, just get plenty of rest."

Something in the sick man's expression made the corner of the soft spoken… Scotsman, right? Yeah… something made the corner of the Scotsman's mouth turn up slightly. "I know, Anthony –" Oh, that was new, someone called him by his full name. And he didn't usually like that, he knew. But from this man, maybe it was OK? "I know, Anthony, that you think that's unlikely to happen with all of us around… we just felt it might help you to know that we're your friends, even if you have no recollection of it just now, and we'll be here if you need us. Now we should leave."

Right now it didn't help at all; he was trapped in a room with people who knew more about him than he did himself, which would have been nasty enough even if what they'd revealed about him so far had been good. He managed a grateful smile for the good old man, but it was laced with bewilderment and panic, and he had no idea how it wrung the kindly doctor's heart to see it. "Come, Ziva, Tim, we should – "

"Toneeee… I went back to the lab to run some tests, so when they said we could see you – well, they could see you, cuz I wasn't here for them to tell – well, I didn't stay long, I left Major Mass-Spec doing the work – and I'm sorry I wasn't here when everyone else was. Well, except Gibbs of course but he's been interrogating the one they captured alive, to find out what happened to you before you got to that Ranger Station, and – " The woman who'd exploded into the room and rushed to seize his hands stopped abruptly, with a look of horror. "Oh, Tony… you haven't the faintest idea of what I'm talking about, have you?"

He looked at the extraordinary goth whirlwind – well, seemed he knew what a goth was – with the intense greeny-grey eyes that pleaded with him to say something she wanted to hear, and he absolutely couldn't do it. He clenched his teeth, closed his eyes and rolled his head to the side away from her, and everyone else in the room. "'M sorry," he croaked. "Go 'way… please, all…"

The woman gave a soft moan of distress, but got the message when he pulled his hands away. What was the point of physical contact if it didn't express comfort? He had none to give, and wanted only to sink back into his miserable, introverted little hole. They didn't want him to come out of it, they wanted _Tony_, and he had nothing in common with him other than the name.

McGee's voice sounded both protective and reproving. "Come on, Abs, there's nothing you can do… if he doesn't want –"

Ducky's voice was sharp. "Timothy, enough. Don't let your anxiety make you unjust. We should leave, we're – "

"Yes, you should." It was Dr. Blamire's voice. "I didn't give permission for a visit yet, and I certainly wouldn't have allowed four people at once. Special Agent DiNozzo requested no visitors before he was ready, I should have thought, Dr. Mallard, that you would have respected that."

"Indeed, Dr. Blamire, and I do apologise. I'm afraid I let anxiety come before good sense."

The wire-tense man in the bed spoke up in the interests of justice. "Dr. Mallard's been suggesting they should go for a while… things just got a bit out of hand. 'S OK…"

The physician looked at the patient's pale face and agitated breathing, and nodded to the other doctor. _Understood. Now please, get them out of here._ Listening in to the injured man's lungs, he asked, "So why did you let them in? I felt myself that your original idea of getting some peace was best."

He didn't want to tell tales; but then again, he didn't want to go through that again. "Well… they'd been out there a while… I was guilted into it really…"

"By the nurses? Not their decision. I'll have words…"

"No… they didn't mean…"

"Mmm. It's not going to happen again. Tests came out fine, by the way. Hmm, your temperature's up slightly." He wrapped the BP cuff round his patient's arm. "…And you're hyper-tensive. My advice? Sleep. I'll give you something if you like."

It was easiest to acquiesce.

They'd still come to see him the following day, singly, in pairs, bringing him books, magazines, the sort of food they said he liked, not staying long because they were afraid of provoking him… they needn't have worried now, he'd realised that he was a guy who was used to exercising self-control – oh, and he could fake it with the best of them. He was as polite as he'd been remote the previous day.

The silver haired guy came and talked to the doctor, put his head round the door and said he'd come back later, which saddened him, because for some reason, he was the one he hoped would stay.

Dr. Blamire gave him something to help him sleep around ten; the cracks in the determined façade were beginning to widen.

Four hours later; two o'clock in the morning… he heard breathing, and cracked an eye open. The silver haired guy was there again, same as that morning. Just as that morning, he was instantly aware that the sleeper was awake.

"Hey…" he held a hand up, palm out. "You want me to go, I'll go. No problem."

He replied with the first thing that came into his mind. "Need the head."

"Can you walk?"

"Sure."

"I'll help you as far as the door, then you're on your own."

"This nightie got an arse in it?"

"Hell, no… but who's to see? OK, OK, I'll find you a robe." The gruff guy was as good as his word, and as his unofficial charge wobbled into the bathroom, he stuck a bag through the doorway. "You might want these. Take care of the arse problem."

The younger man sat down heavily on the toilet seat, and looked curiously into the bag. As well as toiletries, there were boxers, soft grey sweatpants and a hoodie, and he sat for a moment, squeezing the warm, comforting fabric, and feeling utterly lost. The garments seemed familiar… but there wasn't a thread of memory there. He was a blank canvas, an infant… he shuddered and repressed a sob.

When he emerged from the bathroom a few minutes later, dressed in the comfortable garments, he managed to meet the older man's eyes for the first time. They were icy blue, highly intelligent, and held a reserved compassion, which he couldn't bear, so he looked away again.

"Thanks…" he said softly to the floor. "Are these mine?"

"Sure are. I stopped by your place and picked them up."

"Where _is_ my place?"

"Out by Fort Dupont Park…" He was watching him carefully as he spoke. "Nice spot."

The younger man shrugged apologetically as there was clearly not even a glimmer of recognition. He sat down on the edge of his bed, hunching his shoulders, eyes slightly moist. He fisted the tears away angrily.

"Tony…"

"Yeah, that's my name, apparently."

"I won't ask if you're OK… I know you're not. D'you want me to go?"

"Tell me who you are."

"The name's Gibbs, remember? NCIS."

That was the important acronym, somehow Tony knew it. He was thinking of himself by name now, because this man Gibbs had said it. It still rang no bells, but at least now it meant something.

"I'm your boss. And your friend." He held up a hand again, as Tony began to speak. "It's OK that you're not mine. You don't know me. Ducky told me they gave you a hard time, wanting you to remember."

"Well… they're my friends, right?"

"This isn't about them, it's about you."

"Who's me?"

"You sound as if you don't really want to know."

"The young guy, McGee… seems like a nice guy – he's afraid. No. Nervous. _I _ make him nervous. And the beautiful foreign lady. Ziva. She thinks I play malicious jokes. If that's me…"

"Jokes, yes. Malicious? Never. You used to make McGee nervous when he was a probie. Toughened him up – he gives as good as he gets these days. Just doesn't know how to handle this."

"And Abs? I wouldn't let her hold my hands."

"Abby. Our forensic scientist. She adopted you eight years ago when you joined my team. You're like a brother to her."

"I can't remember," Tony muttered despairingly. "You'd think I'd remember…"

"You sure you want to go on with this? I'll go if you'd rather rest."

Tony shook his head. "No… I'm fine. What… why are you smiling?"

Gibbs shook his head gently, and the smile lingered. "You're my Senior Field Agent. I depend on you, and when you remember, you'll understand how much. You've a talent for getting into scrapes – like this one. Tony, if I had a dollar for every time I've heard 'I'm fine' from you, I could retire. D'you need to rest? Shall I come back tomorrow and tell you more?"

"I… I should let _you _get some rest."

"Told ya… it's not about the rest of us. What do _you _want me to do?"

The younger man was diffident. "Well… how did I get like this? Tell me what happened?"

**AN: Probably just one more chapter… don't think it's got much more growing to do.**


	2. Chapter 2

All the Other Acronyms

Chapter 2

Gibbs thought for a long moment, then huffed a resigned sigh. "'Kay…" he said slowly. "First thing ya need to know… I've been where you are."

"You have?"

"Five years ago. After an explosion. I lost fifteen years, not my whole life…" The younger man's eyes were dark with anxiety; Gibbs could see he wanted to ask, but was afraid of the answer, so he got on with it. "It all came back after a few days… or if there's a gap I couldn't tell ya, could I? I don't miss it, whatever it is. But if I seem to be more understanding than the others, that's why."

Tony felt there was more to it than that, but he simply nodded slowly. "They all seem to need something from me… and I don't have it. It's different with each of them, and I don't even know what it is."

"Hey," the silver haired man rumbled in protest, "Don't be thinking I don't want it too. I want my Senior Agent back… my friend, remember? But hell, I know I'm not going to get him just by wanting it to be so."

"Ah… like Abby…" Tony said, smiling for the first time.

The smile was returned. "Oh, yeah. But don't worry, Gibbs'll fix it. Whatever it is."

"Helluva responsibility," Tony said sympathetically. _'Like a sister…'_ he added to himself. She was precious… but it hovered, like everything else, just out of reach. He thought of the other woman, and the smile dropped off his face and fractured all over the floor.

"What?" Gibbs asked softly.

"Ziva… her and me…"

"What's makin' you ask?"

Tony looked very uncomfortable. "She's beautiful… and I know there's something… but the look she gives me…" his pained eyes met the older man's anxiously. "She looks at me like she owns me… but it's not love I see… and she sure hasn't got a very high opinion of me."

Once again, Gibbs thought for a while. "Don't know what to tell ya," he said finally. "You cared… there were always undercurrents… she has a boyfriend down in Florida right now… guess I'm not the one to ask." He decided it wasn't the time to mention rule twelve, or Somalia. Such a lot he _could_ tell DiNozzo, none of it likely to do anything but make things worse.

"OK…" Tony said, looking at his knees. "Best forget I did, then. Maybe I'll remember…"

Gibbs made a move to squeeze his shoulder, but thought better of it. "So… next thing to tell you… there're big gaps in what we know… only person who knows what happened is you. It's in there somewhere… and I haven't manoeuvred you into asking so I can try to force you to remember, OK?"

"Didn't think you would, Boss," the younger man said in surprised protest, and blinked when Gibbs stood up, turned towards him and peered at his face in the dim night-time hospital lighting.

"What did you just say?"

Tony was nonplussed. "Er… I… said I didn't think you would – try to fool me, I mean… and I… said… I said Boss, didn't I? That means something… right?"

This time Gibbs did grip his shoulder. "It's what you call me, Tony… you always have done."

"Seemed to fit." After a long pause, during which neither man seemed to breathe, Tony screwed his face up and shook his head. He echoed Gibbs' words. "So, it's in there somewhere. Tell me the story, Boss, and let's see where it gets us."

Gibbs cleared his throat. "OK… Six days ago. You'd been working too hard." He almost paused for a scornful reaction, but stopped himself. He sure as blazes wasn't going to encourage any more negative thinking. "I'd had to go up to my Dad's for a few days; he'd twisted an ankle. He keeps a store… has one of those ladders you can kick from place to place. He thought he was up one step, and he was up two. You three carried on, caught three cases back to back, two of them fairly straightforward, but no break in between. You'd go home, so that everyone else would, then come back quietly a few hours later to do the paperwork."

"I did that?"

"Sure… you've always done it. Why wouldn't you?"

"Oh… well, I got the impression I wasn't the sort who-"

"Ya got the _wrong_ impression. So… McGee had a virus. He kept working, but he was below par. You tried to persuade him to take time off, but he wouldn't while you were a man down anyway. I'm not saying you carried him, that's not it, but you took as much of his work as you could. Tim told me." He paused, and said delicately, (and his listener got the impression that delicate wasn't something his Boss had much time for,) "Ziva's method of helping in such situations can be a bit … direct."

"You mean… bossy?"

"Er… yeah." Gibbs smiled faintly. He didn't comment on his injured second-in-command's perceptiveness, but he hoped that it was a good sign. Somewhere in there, Tony remembered. "She was a Mossad officer for a long time… kinda gives her an abrasive side… well, hell, by the time I got back, McGee had a stutter, and you had a fixed grin. So… I figured you needed a break. I sent you down to Roanoke, to see a lawyer down there. Could have sent anyone, but you like driving, and the Agency's got this new, tweaked up Equinox, good in the mountains… I told you go… take it and enjoy, and after a bit of huffing and puffing, you took it."

Tony shook his head. "I should remember… hey – I didn't wreck it, did I?"

There it was again… the low self-esteem that had already emerged because Very Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo wasn't really around to stop it. Gibbs hated seeing the damage that the casual neglect of a shallow, self-centred man had inflicted on his child, and knew a few things. He and Senior would never be friends; Junior was an infinitely better man than his father; and he _would_ repair that damage, a bit at a time, every chance he got. "Hell, no… not a mark on it. _You're _not the one with the reputation as a lunatic behind the wheel!"

Tony wondered who was, and then what vehicle he drove himself. He felt as if it should be something fast, but he couldn't answer either question. "So… what did this lawyer want?"

"Well, now, you took the call. He said he was new to the practice, and you said he sounded young and keen. He'd had his attention drawn to a will from six years ago… boundary dispute between two of the beneficiaries; he took a look, and found it was flagged up by us, because the guy had a brother who was a marine, a murder victim, and the case was cold. Hey, what?"

"I don't know, Boss. A picture in my mind… a huge lake… dark blue, beautiful… and horses… odd combination, huh?"

"What triggered it?"

"Screwed if I – no, that word boundary. Something…" He pressed his hands to his temples and groaned.

"Hey… Easy. That _was _something… just don't try to force things. We already know _that's _not working. You want to rest?"

The green eyes were hot, even in the dim light. "_No_! If that was something… _what_ was it?"

"The boundary dispute was between the owner of a riding school and a neighbour, who has frontage onto a lake. Smith Mountain Lake. East of Roanoke… and where we found your 4X4. Look, get back into bed. Come on… good… now rest y'self back." He was piling up the pillows as he spoke. "Now, chill."

A glimmer of the old Tony looked back at him, as the sick man raised one very dubious eyebrow.

Gibbs gave a brief bark of laughter. "I said chill, dammit… OK, the next bit we know becuz we spoke to the lawyer, after you went missing. McGee figured the boundary bit was incontestable; but we wondered if the dispute could shed some historical light on the killing. So you went to take a general look round. The lawyer couldn't tell you much, but he introduced you to Glenys, who'd worked there for fifteen years, and the background she gave you kinda whetted your appetite."

Tony tried to remember Glenys; no luck.

"The guy was murdered at his younger brother's riding school, trying to stop horse-thieves making off with the stock. According to two witnesses, including the brother, when they were alarmed, the rustlers scared up the horses and used them to run him down."

Tony's brow furrowed. A voice was echoing in his mind. He closed his eyes and frowned in concentration. _'Well, Agent DiNozzo, I've seen some tragedies over the years, but I tell you, the state young Michael was in was just terrible. I mean, he saw it happen, and he couldn't do anything… it aged him overnight… it was __**his**__ horses he was protecting… imagine seeing your brother's body trampled to pieces…'_

Glenys… he couldn't see her, but he could sure as hell hear her… He told Gibbs about it, uncertainty in every word. "How do I know it's a memory? Not something I made up?"

"Well, I might say there's no way of telling, but not this time. You called me, and said you were heading over to this riding school, on a hunch, and asked me to look at it from this end. And that was the last we heard from you, until three days later. By then we'd got the background, we had a good idea what your hunch was, we'd found the Equinox, followed your cell phone until it gave out, and still not found you. We were out in the area, wondering what to do next – then we got a call…"

"_Gibbs."_

"_Special Agent Gibbs, this is Marty Hemmings, of the NPRS."_

'National Parks Rangers Service… another freaking acronym,' Tony thought wearily, but he held his tongue.

"_We just received a radio message from our Fairy Stone station. A Special Agent DiNozzo?"_

"_Ya spoke to him?"_

_The tone of the Boss's voice brought the rest of the team crowding in._

"_He asked to be connected to you, but it would have taken too long. He didn't sound too good. I told him I'd contact you right away, and tell you where he was, he was half way through asking me to do that urgently when it sounded as if he passed out. I can send you the location and the quickest route if your phone – "_

_Before the Ranger could begin talking technical stuff, Gibbs had thrust the phone at McGee, and ran for the Equinox, fumbling for the spare key he'd brought. By the time he squealed to a halt beside his two agents, Tim had disconnected and had the location on his laptop. He dived into the back to have more space, then leaned between the front seats towards the satnav, only to think better of it as Gibbs floored the gas pedal. He settled for giving Ziva the information._

"_About fifteen miles, Boss. In this terrain, maybe half an hour…"_

"_Fifteen minutes," Gibbs ground out, and Tim's half formed idea to radio for a helicopter almost died before it was born. But, he thought sickly, even though they could get there before a chopper could, they didn't know what they'd find when they got there, so he called anyway. _

_In the front, he saw Ziva abandoning pride and clinging to the OS handle. He braced his feet against the back of her seat, determined that his laptop wouldn't be sacrificed to Gibbs' determination to beat the clock. The road wound up a hillside in a lazy V; Gibbs cut it off at its widest point._

"_I'm glad he didn't do that downhill," Ziva yelled over her shoulder; they crested the hill, and a moment later, he did._

"Ah," Tony said with a tiny gleam of satisfaction.

"Ah?"

"I was wondering who the demon driver was."

"Ah."

_On the next ridge, still about a mile away, they could see the splash of brown amid the bluey-green; the ranger station with its fire-watch tower beside it. Ziva said urgently, "Look there!" Coming from the north, and closer than they were, was a red heavy-duty GMC, heading for the station. "I do not believe that is a coincidence," she added, reaching for her Sig. Gibbs set the Chevvy at an intercept angle, and he and McGee both drew their handguns. _

"_Tyres," the Boss barked. Well, he didn't believe in coincidence either, but it __**could**__ be an innocent visitor. Rule 18… they could apologise later. As the Sierra lurched to a halt, nearside tyres shredded, they were aware of a figure decamping on the far side and running, doubled up, towards the building. Gibbs stamped on the brake, they piled out, and without discussion, sent a barrage of shots kicking up the ground in front of the running figure. _

"_NCIS! Stand still or you're next!" Gibbs' yell, heard above the sound of the shots echoing off the hills, was enough to bring the man to a halt; he spread his arms wide._

"_We will deal with him" Ziva told Gibbs. He nodded and ran._

"Just one guy? Abby said something about only one captured alive…"

"Relax, Tony… that's Abbyspeak. We didn't kill anyone. Neither did you, if that's what you were thinking."

"Good to know…"

_The door to the station stood ajar; there was a lobby with a door to a toilet, a rack of information leaflets, and an archway into the next room. Gibbs went through it at high speed, his gun sweeping the area ahead, then he dropped to his knees as he holstered the Sig. "Ah, hell, DiNozzo…"_

_He lay face down; the microphone dangled on its cable near his head, and the radio operator's chair was on its side nearby. His clothes were torn and dirty; it was all good mountain dirt but there was plenty of it. It mingled with the blood on his back, and when Gibbs hauled his shirt up to look, the wound beneath his right shoulder blade was inflamed and nasty. So, as the Boss turned him over carefully, was the long score down his right arm. And the one across the bridge of his left foot. The swelling was so bad the shoe, what was left of it, would have to be cut off. How the hell had he walked here? _

"Thought my foot hurt a lot…"

"You never asked?"

"Other things on my mind, I guess."

"Ducky reckons you got stamped on. By a horse."

"Oh…" There wasn't much else to say.

_Assorted cuts, bruises, scrapes and abrasions, too numerous to count, cracked ribs – jeez, he could feel them, but not even a wince from Tony… and the heat coming off him that Gibbs had been aware of from the moment he knelt beside him, made the Senior Agent lift his head for a moment, and listen more in hope than expectation, for the sound of the helicopter. More worrying yet was the total lack of response from DiNozzo when his Boss spoke to him. He shook his shoulder, but his head lolled slightly, and there was no sign of life other than the slow, laboured breathing._

"The chopper crew weren't too pleased when I insisted on Bethesda. The other two weren't too pleased when I sent them back to DC with the suspect instead of getting LEOs to do it.–"

"Who was he? Did he do me all that damage?" Tony leapt in with the question before his mind went skittering off after another acronym, and he lost it altogether.

"His name's Jeremy Goodman. Mean anything? Hell, no, forget I asked. I'm the one who said take it easy…"

"It does mean something," Tony said thoughtfully. "There was… I remember a woman saying that name… horses again… and something about bears…" He grimaced, and clutched his head again, and a long, frustrated groan escaped in spite of his efforts to suppress it.

"I shouldn't have pushed," Gibbs said, shaking his head contritely. "I thought you were starting to relax a bit. I should have left it at that."

"Never apologise, it's a sign of weakness," the other man murmured softly, and was surprised to see the blue eyes widen. "I've said something again…"

"Yeah, DiNozzo, you have… does 'Gibbs' rules' ring any sort of bells?"

"You live by them… you teach them to us…" He jerked forwards, drawing a sharp breath. "Rule nine. Never go anywhere without a knife. I think… ah, shit… I think I lost mine. It was important…" He fell back against the pillows in exhausted distress.

"Ssshh," Gibbs found himself soothing. He pressed the button to lower the head of the bed down, and began to pull the covers up, while the other man looked at him in confusion. "It's OK, Tony… rest now… we found it."

**AN: Sorry for typos or anything else… I've read through once but I'm about to faceplant in my desk. Night night…**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: Hmm…It's taken me four days to get out a chapter with nary a scrap of action. Such is life.**

All the Other Acronyms

Chapter 3

As Gibbs quietly closed the door of DiNozzo's room behind him, he became aware of a muted, but familiar sound. There were two rows of seats in the waiting area, placed back to back; those totally unwelcoming low-backed, inadequately padded chairs so beloved of hospitals. They really don't want you to stay! From the far side rose the sound of soft snoring; facing him, the long form of McGee was folded uncomfortably across four of the tortuous things.

Gibbs moved silently towards the archway into the corridor where the coffee machine stood, but as his shadow fell across Tim, the young agent shot up and sprang to his feet, wincing as his muscles protested their sleep abuse. "Boss!" Anxious or not, he kept his voice low.

"Was tryin' not to wake you, McGee." So did Gibbs.

"'s OK, Boss, I wasn't really sleeping… how is he?"

Gibbs jerked his head towards the corridor, and Tim fell into step beside him. As they passed the chairs, the senior agent observed there were _two _women curled up sleeping. He reached the machine, dropped coins into the slot, pushed buttons, and handed Tim the nearest approximation it would give to his preferred drink.

"Thanks, Boss."

Gibbs didn't speak until he'd extracted his own evil brew, or something close. "Up one minute, down the next. He's sleeping right now."

"That's good… did he –"

"Some. He called me Boss – didn't realise until I pointed it out. He remembers a dark blue lake, and horses. Reckon we know more about that than he does."

"Did you tell him what we know?"

"No… maybe when I think he's up to it, but I kinda figured the time to fill in the blanks was when he had something to relate them to. He remembered the woman in the lawyer's office talking about the murder, although he couldn't remember her face; he remembered another woman's voice, and something about horses again… and bears… I said I shouldn't have pushed him, and he quoted rule six."

"He remembers your rules, Boss?"

Gibbs gave a slight, rueful smile. "That one… and rule nine. He knew he'd lost his knife… calmed down when I told him we'd found it. That's when I convinced him to sleep awhile more."

Tim realised they'd stopped by the machine, and wondered how much was not to disturb the girls, and how much was for Gibbs to have a refill on hand. Now, as the boss peered into his half-empty cup and huffed even more ruefully, he realised Gibbs had more on his mind than coffee.

"Boss….?"

Gibbs sighed. "He was worried he'd crashed the car, he was worried he'd killed someone and couldn't remember; he was surprised that he went back in at night to do everyone's paperwork, said he didn't sound the type from what he'd heard. Said he can't tell us what we want to hear, and thinks we have a low opinion of him because of it, or just anyway, dammit all, and what the hell did Ziva say to him?"

"I… ah… you ought to ask Ziva that, Boss."

"Well, hell, I'll do that, McGee, but why not save me the time?"

"She… er," it came out in a rush. "She thought he was joking and told him to stop. But Boss… I said… I started to say that he'd try to remember if he wanted to, and Ducky shut me up… we were all just too anxious… we were all thinking what it'd be like to never have Tony back, and –" he broke off and squared his shoulders. "We could have done better at thinking how he felt, Boss." He paused. "Even Ducky got it wrong… the doctor had a go at him, and Tony spoke up to defend him…" He sighed, and finally took a chance on the boss thinking him weak, as he realised he was desperate for a crumb of comfort from somewhere. "This is all just _bad_, Boss…"

Gibbs nodded slowly. Small wonder Tony didn't know which way up was sideways. But… he looked at the young agent, who stood with guilt, worry and weariness oozing from every pore. It wasn't _just___about Tony. He finally said quietly, "How we handle him depends on what's best for him, not what's best for us, McGee. Doesn't stop how you feel, though. Give yourself a break… go home, take a shower, get something to eat and a few hours comfortable sleep. I'll call you if there's anything."

Tim looked him in the eyes. "And what'll you be doing in the meantime, Boss?"

"Aaah… sleep's not my thing."

Tim dug a handful of coins out of his pocket, and began feeding the machine. He handed Gibbs his refill. "Guess I'll go home when everyone else does, then, Boss."

Gibbs didn't reply, simply nodded at the younger man with satisfaction and pride, and started back up the corridor.

Tony curled up onto his side as he heard the door close softly. He was tired, but he didn't feel as though sleep would come; still, if it would reassure the boss then he'd at least try. Did he imagine the thumb that rubbed his bruised temple so gently? He must be good at dissembling, since he was damn sure Gibbs wouldn't have done it if he'd known he was still awake. ("So… we already know I'm good at faking things… hell, is that what I do? Is that all I do? Is that me?") But the gesture had been so comforting he'd felt bereft when, after only a couple of seconds, it had stopped.

The room was warm, the sweats he wore were warm, but he shivered violently, and huddled into the foetal position. He let his thoughts drift, thinking again of the blue lake… It wasn't the light blue of reflected sky, or the steely blue-grey he was more used to seeing, it was a deep blue like a sapphire, sitting in the midst of emerald green banks and tall trees. There was a black horse, an enormous animal, at the sight of it every ache in his body surged up; there was a dirt track leading down to a neat, one storey log house, and the blue lake beyond. For a moment, there was a smiling face, an elderly man, but he couldn't hang on to it.

The brakes seemed to be off; he felt as if he'd gone straight into REM without the benefits of stage four sleep first, hell, he wasn't even asleep, and heaven preserve him from more freaking acronyms! His mind began to play him random clips from movies of his life: tumbling out of an aeroplane and hurtling down until his parachute opened, letting out a wild yell of exhilaration at the sensation; Gibbs handing him a gun and a badge, saying 'You'll do'; a beautiful woman smiling at him and telling him that tonight they were going dancing. Those two pictures made him hurt somewhere inside his chest.

Tied to a chair in what looked like a hotel room, arguing with Ziva about a plan; standing by a paddock rail watching horses, another man standing by him speaking with pride about his riding school – no, grander than that, equestrian centre… then he was sitting at a polished table, opposite a young man whose face and arms bore the signs of trauma, his heart aching for the boy's heartbreak, even though he couldn't remember what it was. Josh…

He stood in the hallway of a large house, a uniformed man… a chauffeur, that was it, waiting beside him with his luggage, and another man towering over him, ordering him, 'You _will _like military school.' Stumbling down a mountainside, finding a marker post and collapsing against it, touching it as if he couldn't quite believe it was there; Abby with a German Shepherd dog, and McGee in the background… bleeding, for crissakes… with a bemused expression on his face… and another beautiful woman falling backwards with a bullet hole in her forehead, her blood spattering his face. Oh God… He yelled "Kate!" and sat bolt upright, drawing up his knees and curling over them, his head in his hands.

Outside, four people charged towards the door at once, one of them stopping halfway. "No," Tim said softly. "No, let Gibbs. Wait until he says we can."

"But Tim…"

"No, Abs… just wait, huh?"

"But why, Tim? Why can't we help?"

"Come and sit down, Abs… and you, Ziva… I'll tell you…"

Gibbs flashed him a look that said 'good work', 'don't envy you', and 'hang in there', all at once, and made up his mind to actually drop the functional mute thing and say it aloud to McGee as soon as he could. Right now… he hurried through the door. "Hey…"

Tony raised his head; his face was pale. It was the first time Gibbs had ever seen naked fear in his eyes. He often wished for his SFA's carefully crafted mask to be set aside, now it was, it was a painful thing to see. "Boss… are you sure nobody died? Did I kill someone? I remember Kate…"

Gibbs sat down on the edge of the bed, where he'd perched not so long ago. "Well… you do know you didn't kill her, right?"

"Yeah…"

"What _do _you remember?" And as Tony described that day, his boss thought how bloody unfair life is, if that's the sort of memory it gives back.

"I… remember you up on that roof, Boss… getting me back into action… I…remember trying to tell…"

"You tried to tell McGee, and you couldn't speak, so I told him. You cared for Kate… you couldn't say she was dead; couldn't speak the words. D'you remember anything else about that day?"

A slow shake of the head. "But… I know who you _are_, Boss."

"Good, then… good…" Gibbs almost choked up, and swore at himself internally. "OK… you didn't kill anyone on this case. Right? You _have _killed before, but never willingly. I guess that'll be a downside of your memories as they return."

"Everyone has bad memories, huh, Boss? Don't know if they can be worse than none… I want them back, all of them." He shivered again. Gibbs located the robe he'd used earlier, and put it loosely round his shoulders.

"Understood. Anything else come back?"

"Yeah… all of a jumble. McGee, Abby, Ziva… you… and other things that might be this case – it's hard to say." He saw a succession of emotions crossing Gibbs' face, and said softly, "What?"

"It doesn't matter…"

"Never the case with you." The blue eyes widened, startled. "Again, what?"

"That's vintage DiNozzo."

"Don't deflect, Boss. Why didn't you like what you were thinking?"

"…(sigh)… I've just been talking to McGee about letting you do this your way… you can bet that right now he's out there telling the girls the same thing –"

"They're all still out there?" Now the green eyes were wide with surprise.

"You still don't think you merit friends?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Sure, they're still out there… they might not have gone about it with much finesse, but they still want to help. They've not left. Except for Ducky. I practically ordered him home to rest, but he'll be back first thing, bet on it. If the doctor hadn't put his foot down, they'd be dotted all around your floor."

"Not the doctor's fault… it was what I wanted." Tony spoke into his knees.

"Like I _said_, letting you do it your way."

"But?"

Gibbs smiled and shook his head. Tenacity _was_ one of the things that made DiNozzo a damn' good investigator. "O…Kay… didn't wanna say, _but_, if they're all there in the things you remember, maybe they should hear them? If it'd help to talk?" And still Tony managed to surprise him.

"Yes," he said firmly, at once. "It's the least they deserve for all that waiting. Just – " he leapt rashly off the bed. … "I need to pee," he finished urgently, and disappeared unsteadily into the bathroom, leaving Gibbs shaking his head. He wished Senior could see the kid who'd raised himself now. He went across to the waiting room door.

When the nurse came to do her regular check on the patient five minutes later, she found him sitting on his bed, one leg drawn up, the injured foot hanging slightly over the edge. On the other end of the bed, the goth girl who'd been prowling round the waiting area for most of the day sat cross legged. The foreign girl sat on the window ledge, the young guy in the bedside chair, and the one who gave the orders stood leaning against the wall. Nurse Danielle raised her eyebrows enquiringly at Tony, who smiled, a genuine smile, the first she'd seen, so she left them to it.

It was a good idea, and not such a good idea… Tony relaxed, and the others relaxed around him. Gibbs said very little, even when the memory of his leaving was brought up, and then only to calm them, since everyone was speaking at once.

"Gibbs went to stay with his old boss in Mexico…" "We got another Probie," "But it was OK, Tony, because Gibbs came back…"

"Hey!" There were all sorts of ways this could go, and not all of them happy memories… they moved on.

Gibbs filled in details on the parachute jump, with a careful, "Kate was with us in those days."

Tony nodded sadly. "She wanted to rappel," he recalled, and Gibbs didn't complicate things by saying that was a different case.

One of the things Tony asked about was the dog he'd remembered, and for a while there was a more cheerful discussion of the Shepherd named after Gibbs. "Wasn't there another one… before that… called Tony?"

Only Gibbs recalled that. "Sniffer dog… you and the handler spent your time getting on each other's nerves… you're good friends these days. Kent Fuller, DEA." He knew he'd said the wrong thing right away, but he'd no idea what. The injured man's eyes went pained and faraway, and he fell silent.

_DEA, CIA, ICE…ICE. Michael Rivkin killed an ICE agent. I killed Rivkin… Ziva said I betrayed her. And I wanted all my memories back… _He rubbed his chest instinctively, but didn't know why, until more memories of that time that he _didn't_ want came surging over him. Gibbs said "I think you've had enough for now, DiNozzo. Get some sleep. Shall I ask the nurse to give you something?"

The others took the hint and trooped out with whispered goodnights, and Tony got himself together enough to call "Thanks, guys," before shaking his head at Gibbs. "I killed her boyfriend… how can she… how can anyone call me friend?"

Gibbs looked at him sadly. "When you remember, you'll understand," he said finally. "It's a pity you're not still hooked up to the PCA… I'd be tempted to grab the button and give you a quick shot."

"PCA… DEA, ICE, our lives are defined by fucking acronyms…" the younger man said despondently, and Gibbs, although he knew now how Tony had arrived at the Rivkin thing, couldn't think of a thing to reply. Tony only ever used profanity when his defences were way down. He sat down in the chair, and Tony understood this meant sleep, so he lay down again to try. _'C'mon, brain, show me something nice…'_ He recalled the beautiful mountain lake again, he knew its name since Gibbs had told him, he was looking for something on a satnav, so he must have been sitting in the Equinox, and he saw that black horse again; but his brain had had enough, exhaustion was pulling him down, and he found himself praying for stage four.

Gibbs waited until his SFA's breathing had evened out, then stepped into the waiting area again. The others regarded him expectantly.

"Well, he's asleep. He seems to be getting the bad things back – he remembered shooting Michael Rivkin."

Ziva said "Oh," quietly, but added nothing more.

"I guess I'm hopeful," the senior agent said. "I started remembering with the worst memories I had…"

"Perhaps," Ziva said thoughtfully, "Since it seems as if his former memories _will_ return –" she spoke as if they wouldn't dare not to – "If we look at the things he recalled that are new to us, we might find something to help him recall his missing days." She looked round; nobody disagreed.

The machine didn't sell CafPow, but Abby went down anyway. A few minutes later, armed with coffee, they sat in a huddle, as the dawn began to break.

"So… what did he recall? A huge black horse…" Tim began to jot things down on his ever present lap-top.

"Tony said all his bruises hurt when he thought of it. So the horse must have something to do with them… was it a horse from the centre?" Abby asked.

"Ducky said the injury to his foot was caused by a shod horse," Ziva added in support.

"I wondered," Tim mused, "if he was high above the lake, looking down at some point. He mentioned steep banks, and water close up doesn't have that colour. When we were up at Smith Mountain, it didn't, but from higher up, it might."

"Well, we know he was a long way up when we found him, but more than twenty miles away. Can't figure a connection yet. Go on," Gibbs urged.

"Everything else, we can identify, I think. I know, we should not assume… but we know he went to see Selwyn Hughes, because Mr. Hughes told us so, and he is an elderly man with a log home by a lake. So unless there is another such man, we –" Ziva broke off with a sigh. "We already know that part of the story. We can learn nothing more from it."

"Didn't Mr. Hughes's story help us to figure out what Tony's hunch was?" Abby asked. "Maybe if we asked him he could tell us more. Except not at this time of the morning, of course."

Tim tapped his computer again. "Tony was alerted by something that Glenys said. She said the younger, surviving brother, Michael, aged overnight. Mr. Hughes said that he didn't see him for a couple of weeks after the killing, he stayed in the house or went away. When he came back he'd aged. He told Tony that." He tapped again, and turned the screen to face everyone.

"On the left, Michael Safin, stable owner, aged thirty. On the right, Marine First Lieutenant Bernie Safin, aged thirty-two. What jumps off the screen?"

"They could almost be twins," Abby said. "We were right. Tony's hunch was right… the Marine took his dead brother's place."

"Well, yeah…" Gibbs growled. "Did he kill him or take advantage of the situation to get out of the corps… and how's it relevant to the situation now, since the other brother's _also _dead?"

"Reckon I can tell you that, Boss…" A strained voice spoke from the doorway. Tony was leaning against the frame for support; as they left everything and hurried to him, his legs gave way and he sat down in a heap on the floor.

**AN: All **_**will**_** be explained, if I can get it right, that is. Last time I wrote a convoluted thing, I lost most of my marbles on the way. Here go a few more. Review? Please?**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: The interlude with Nurse Danielle, while not contributing to the storyline, was fun to write, for a new friend.**

All the Other Acronyms

Chapter 4

Well… this was better…

He shouldn't have leapt out of bed again, he knew damn well; it left him breathless, and it sure as hell hurt his injured foot, which was how he'd found himself sitting on the floor.

Gibbs had taken one glance, seen that Tony was back, and gone into Freshly Poked Bear mode, remembering the unsteady progress towards the bathroom earlier, and annoyed with himself that he hadn't moved fast enough to catch his SFA on the way down. "DiNozzo, will you never learn?"

"Sorry, Boss… just, well, I kind of needed to see you all –"

"You remember," McGee had said with certainty, his voice laced with such relief that Tony would have been in no doubt of where they stood, even without the surge of returning memories.

"Oh yeah…" they'd found themselves grinning inanely at each other, and neither knew which one stuck the hand out first, but the grip was more like an arm-wrestle than a polite handshake.

Ziva had been a little more prim, although she was smiling; "It is good to have you back, Tony," but he knew she meant it.

Abby had regarded him with those big greeny eyes, also smiling, but a little subdued, Tony thought. He hadn't meant to hurt her… he opened his mouth to break rule six for the second time in a minute, but the Bear was getting impatient.

"So, ya got your breath back? Can you stand up yet?"

"Er… yeah…"

By the time Gibbs and Tim had got him carefully to his feet, Abby had shed her boots, and jumped up on the bed, but this time at the top, and now here she was, sitting behind him. She was leaning against a pillow, and he was leaning the uninjured side of his back against her; she'd piled the other pillows behind his injured side… and he remembered, with her arms around him like tentacles, just how it felt to be loved by Abby.

He looked at Ziva, who'd taken Abby's old position at the foot of the bed. He'd loved her too, a different, painful, passionate sort of love, that had sent him to an African hell-hole in search of vengeance. He remembered the other two men right there alongside him and his throat constricted. They were there for _his_ sake, not hers, they'd thought she was dead. With Saleem's poison running through his brain he'd told her the truth, and wondered if a time would come when she…

In the space of a heartbeat he remembered being trapped in the men's room, not for the first time, and told all the things he'd done wrong… then Damon Werth, Dana Hutton, Brenda Bittner, (if that counted since she'd pursued him and he'd finally given in, shallow idiot that he was,) and now Ray Whoever… well, if it could be as intense as Tel Aviv and Somalia and still come out nowhere, then nowhere it was. He doubted he'd ever love that way again, and pushed it aside. He recalled he was good at that, as a way of dealing with – no, if ever there was a time _not _to be poking away at past hurts it was now.

She lifted her head, unreadable brown eyes met his, they exchanged tentative smiles, and that was that.

Even Gibbs was looking weary, although everyone piled into the room felt happier now, as the morning light grew stronger outside, and hospital routine sounds began to filter in from the corridors. Tim fetched an extra chair from the waiting room, and they all sat down to investigate.

"You up to this, Tony?"

"I'll let you know when I'm not."

"If I don't do it for you," an irate voice spoke from the doorway.

"Oh… er, Nurse Danielle…"

"Have you all been sitting here since last time I looked in?" The pretty brunette's hands were on her hips and her blue eyes were flashing.

Gibbs rose to his feet ready to do battle, but it didn't do him any good. "No, we haven't. We – "

"Doesn't matter." With all the fury of an enraged hamster on the attack, the tiny nurse got straight in his face, and the team were amazed to see the Boss take a step back. "I thought you said you cared about him? He needs rest, and peace, and not constant interruption and pressure. Out. _Now_."

Gibbs, kneecaps bitten, said very mildly, _apologetically_, even, "Nurse – Tony's remembered. He needed us."

"Oh!" Her anger dissipated instantly, as she turned back to her patient. "You've remembered? Really? Everything?" The furious frown became a beaming smile.

"Really. Danielle, don't chase my friends out… please… we need to talk about things. I'm fine…"

She took note of that 'my friends'; she knew that the day staff had been reprimanded for allowing them in when the patient didn't know them, and understood that with the returning memory they'd all been relieved of unbearable stress. She smiled inside, but said tartly, "I'll be the judge of whether you're fine or not, Special Agent DiNozzo," and slapped the sphygmomanometer cuff on his arm. "Hmm… right. One: you're not to get out of that bed again except to go to the bathroom." She glared at his unusual human pillow, who smiled happily back. "Two: it's getting on for six o'clock. The day staff start at seven. You've got until I stick my head round the door to say goodbye at ten to, and if you're not ready to leave I'll drag you all out myself. You –" turning back to Tony, "need at least an hour's rest before Dr. Blamire does his rounds, or you're likely to spend the day on sedatives. Understood?"

"Understood. Thanks, Danni…" She rolled her eyes at him and left them to it. "She's kind," Tony added. "Fierce, but kind." Gibbs sat down slowly and said nothing.

Tony waited… "You want me to start? OK…"

He looked round. "Well, now, let's see. I went to see the lawyer, Tom Wallis in Roanoke. Took a subpoena like he asked…"

"_Yes, that's in order." He handed Tony the copy of the will that he'd promised him. "Thanks for that, Special Agent DiNozzo… it protects me. That woman is proving to be more trouble the second time around."_

"_Tony. That woman? The second time?"_

_Wallis went back behind his desk and sat down, inviting Tony to sit in the comfortable leather chair in front with a sweep of his hand. He opened a drawer and lifted out a folder. _

"_The wording of your subpoena's pretty broad… I got this out because I felt it might relate... I've always felt something wasn't right about all this."_

_Tony took the folder with a polite thank you, as the secretary brought coffee. "Divorce documents?"_

"_Michael married Rebecca Stone eight years ago. Two years later, she left. That was when he made the will, leaving everything to his brother, except a lakeside cabin and the small piece of land it stood on, to Selwyn Hughes. He also began divorce proceedings, but when his brother was murdered, he left them in abeyance. About two years later, just after I joined the firm, she's back, and he instructs me that he doesn't wish to proceed with the divorce, so these documents just went into store._

"_Beats me why, because every time I ever saw them it was obvious they couldn't stand each other; Glenys and everyone else here agreed. He ran the stables, him and Jeremy. She never went near the horses… likes the high life, fancies herself as a businesswoman. That's what the dispute's about. She wants that land on the lake. I'm getting ahead of myself here… I told her she hadn't a chance, my predecessor drew the will up very well. It was when I studied it I saw the flagging up by your agency."_

_Tony frowned. "Mmm. The brother's murder remains unsolved, so we flagged anything that could possibly be of interest; wills and such get a marker as soon as they're registered. So… she came back after the brother was murdered. The brother he left everything to. And now Michael's dead himself?"_

"_He died in a boating accident just over a year ago."_

"Accident?" Tony asked mordantly.

"_Oh, yes. Quite a few people said the same thing… but he was alone in the boat, and there were no witnesses."_

"_I wish we'd got wind of that," Tony said. "Wonder why we didn't? You said something wasn't right… I'd say you're not wrong."_

"_Well… I didn't know the will was flagged until I looked at it – maybe the Sheriff's department never knew of your interest in the brothers." He looked the Special Agent straight in the eyes. "The stables went to Rebecca, as next of kin, since the main beneficiary of the will was already dead. Why didn't Michael alter it? Don't ask me. But I'll tell you, she was absolutely wild when she found out about the lakeside land going to Selwyn."_

_Tony nodded. "You're saying there could be two murders here?"_

_Tom Wallis laughed. "I'm a lawyer, Tony. I'm not __**saying**__ anything… but I could be inviting you to think in a certain way… Glenys'll make you copies of those papers… and she was here before I was. She might be a good person to talk to. Come on, I'll introduce you."_

Tony paused to gather his thoughts, and Gibbs reminded the others of what Glenys had said.

Tim said thoughtfully, "That was where we were up to when you called us and asked us to start pulling information – except that we didn't know exactly what she'd said until we got there and talked to her ourselves, then we had a good idea what your hunch was. Dead brother unrecognisable, surviving brother ages overnight… we'd have spotted the switch then." He sighed.

"Out with it, McGee," Tony told him softly.

"Well… you were so damn sketchy on the phone… Tony, why didn't you _tell_ us what you knew? What your hunch was… maybe – we could have got there so much sooner…"

The others looked at him reprovingly, but Tony didn't take offence. "Well, yeah, I know that now," he admitted. "I just wasn't sure enough, Tim. I intended to go talk to the Sheriff who investigated, then I thought as I was driving that it'd be better to ask you to pull up the report on Michael's death, without him knowing. Roanoke's not that big a city… so I tried, but I was in a poor reception spot, so I decided to try later."

Ziva nodded. "We began to gather as much background as we could. Unfortunately there was no record of Glenys having been interviewed at the time, or we may have realised what your hunch was earlier. But when we discovered that the man now running the stables for Rebecca Safin was Jeremy Goodman, who had been the other witness to Bernie Safin's murder, we were worried. When you had not contacted us for four hours, and we could not reach you, we became anxious –"

"And when we discovered that Goodman was also the name of a Deputy Sheriff in Roanoke, we set off for the place right away," Tim finished.

"Ah… I wondered how they found out who I was," Tony said reflectively. "One moment everything's fine, next I'm being chased down by that big black horse. Warrior, his name was…"

_He came down towards the North Shore area from the north-west, and as the Equinox growled to the top of a hill, his breath hitched slightly. The lake spread out below him, with its steep banks, crinkled coastline and many winding branches; purple-blue amid the green,, sunlit and beautiful. He pulled onto the grass and switched the engine off, just to admire._

_He'd been tired, Gibbs was right; sitting up here was good for the spirit, and although he knew he had a job to do – Tom Wallis had clearly pointed him in the direction of a can of worms just begging to have the lid removed – a small pause for contemplation wasn't going to hurt. He got out of his vehicle and sat on the hood; the mountain air felt good…_

_He heard a sound he hadn't heard in a while, and turned his head. A huge black horse was approaching over the grass, at a fast lope despite the steepness of the hill, ridden by a fair haired young woman. He slowed willingly enough at the top, and the rider reined in alongside Tony._

"_Hi! It's a great view from up here, isn't it?" Her accent was English._

"_Hi. Yeah… first time I've seen it. Just had to pull over and take a good look."_

"I never get tired of looking… I exercise the horses up here every chance I get."

'_Great,' Tony thought, 'Way in.' "Horses, plural? Are you from the equestrian centre?"_

"_That's right. You've heard of it?"_

"_I saw it on the map of the area. He's got to be the biggest horse I've ever seen."_

"_He's a gentle giant… his dad was a heavy draught horse, and he's certainly the biggest horse I ever rode. His name's Warrior. I call him Softy. I'm Natalie. Natalie Cornwell."_

"_Tony Del Piero. He does look kind of like a mediaeval war horse." That brought a pleased smile from the rider. "Do you run the riding school?"_

_The young woman giggled, as the horse fidgeted. "Heck, no. Jeremy does. But it's owned by – oh, damn." _

_A silver Mercedes pulled up alongside Tony's car, blocking the road. The window slid down, and the well dressed woman inside said sharply, "Natalie, you're paid to exercise the horses, not stand around chatting."_

_Ah… the boss. And clearly not above publicly embarrassing her workers. Tony spoke quickly. "No, no, no… that's not it at all, Ma'am. I'm up here on business, and I was asking about the centre… I was thinking I'd like to come back when I wasn't so busy, to do some riding. The young lady was just giving me some information. I was thinking of calling in later."_

"_Ah. Well Natalie, you'd better make sure you're back by the time the gentleman calls." She drove off with a squeal that made the horse shy slightly._

"_Thank you. That was really good of you." _

_Tony smiled and shrugged. "My pleasure." He already knew that Rebecca Safin had no interest in her horses, but he affected bewilderment as he said so. Natalie snorted._

"_She's a first rate cow," she said in her impeccable English. "I come here every summer, to earn University funds. If I had to stand her for longer, I'd probably push her in the lake. Have to go on Selwyn's land to do it though." All Tony had to do was raise a puzzled eyebrow to get the whole story._

Selwyn Hughes was an elderly carpenter, who'd worked with Michael when he'd taken over the run-down riding school. He'd built, and repaired, and painted, and helped to make the place look good enough to attract customers. Michael had made sure that if anything happened to him, Selwyn and his cabin would be safe, which showed rare forethought, now that Michael's widow wanted that valuable bit of lake frontage for the hotel she intended to build for riding holidaymakers.

"It was getting pretty convoluted," Tony said ruefully. "The wife came back – did she know it was Bernie, not Michael, or did she find out when she got there?"

"Whatever," Gibbs said. "But Bernie's over a barrel, because all she needs to say is, 'You're not my husband', and he's in trouble. So he has to go along with it and have her back."

"The lawyer said he did not know why Michael didn't change his will," Ziva said. "He was Bernie, so he never knew the will existed."

"And the other witness, Jeremy Goodman… he lied about which brother died, so he was open to blackmail too."

"Yeah," Tony said bleakly, feeling again the unexpected piercing pain in his back. "I found that out."

**AN: Reading back, (sigh) I realise I've not advanced the story very much at all, but I have to post something… action next. How **_**did**_** Tony get hurt?**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: I forgot a couple of things… I neither own nor profit from anything to do with the TV show NCIS. And I forgot to say ta to VP for suggesting a very suitable name for a big black horse!**

All the Other Acronyms

Chapter 5

"I waited," Tony said slowly. "Yeah, that's it. I let Natalie get the horse well clear, before I started up again; didn't want to give him another fright. I followed the satnav down and found the equestrian centre. First thing I noticed was the way the original track down to the cabin had gone through the centre's land; you could see where it had been blocked off, and now there was just a rough dirt-track round the edge. There was an old guy, outdoor tan, wiry, tough… but he was having trouble moving some sacks of road stone. I pulled over."

"_Hey… you got your hands full there… need some help?"_

"_Well…hell, yeah, son, if you don't mind. Damn delivery guy wouldn't bring his truck up the track… dumped it all here. And I need it down the other end." He passed a hand over his brow. "You can see, I'm trying to build a road here."_

"I got the whole story while I helped ol' Selwyn to lift the sacks of stone into his pickup. Rebecca Safin had refused him access once she knew she couldn't get his land by fair means, so she was making life difficult. He was a tough cookie, though…"

"_I went to see that same lawyer who'd done the will. Said he couldn't act for me, cuz he was already the Safins' lawyer, but he put me onto a friend, sent him a copy of the will… first time I ever __**liked **__a lawyer! Well, this other legal eagle drew me up a will, my daughter's lawyer in Pittsburgh has looked over it too, heh heh…says it's airtight. She gets the cabin when I go, and I asked that young Wallis guy to make sure Rebecca knew! I didn't want to be the next one to have an accident!"_

"I left the car where it was, and rode down with him to help him unload at the other end. I kind of liked him right away, but I didn't want him to drop that he'd been talking to a fed, so I spun the same tale I'd told Natalie. I asked him what he meant…"

"_You want a riding holiday, son, you can't go wrong. There's a good little hotel five hundred yards round the next bend. Not like the fancy thing Rebecca wants to build." The old man reached into a small cooler on his back porch, and pulled out two light beers. Seeing Tony's look, he said, "You prefer something non- alky-frolic?"_

"_Well, yeah, thanks, I'm driving."_

"_Sure…" he dug out a cola. "Yeah… the horses are good, well cared for, Jeremy does a good job .And young Natalie, and Josie. The scenery's great. You'd have a great time." He waved an expansive hand over the view. "I've got thirty-three and a half yards of lake front here; you can see the fence where that hill starts to rise is where my land ends. That hill belongs to her, but to terrace it to put a hotel on would be too expensive. So she wants my cabin and its thirty-three and a half yards!"_

"_What about the other side?"_

"_Belongs to the State of Virginia, and they won't sell to anyone." Tony could see that the old man couldn't keep the note of satisfaction out of his voice, and he nodded approvingly._

"_So… accidents? Do people who ride here have accidents?"_

"He didn't seem to suspect that the aged-overnight guy he thought was Michael was actually Bernie – he just said that Michael used to be his friend but now he just waved from a distance from time to time. He was a changed man because of his grief. When Michael(-who-was-really-Bernie)" – MWWRB – he thought – "went missing, Selwyn was one of the many people who joined the search. Up near the dam at the head of the lake, there's a barrier wire, to stop boats from coming near the intakes, where the current's very strong. Michael's dinghy was found up against the barrier – "

"Six months later," Abby jumped in eagerly when he paused for breath, "a body was found caught in fallen branches, half submerged, about a mile away. Only the clothes and dental records confirmed that it was Michael." Tony began to wriggle round to look at her.

"But – "

"He'd only been with that dentist since his brother died. We're still trying to run down who Michael's dentist was before, we're sure those records would be very different… but US Marine records confirm that the teeth of the drowning victim are those of Bernie, with work since his 'death' also matching Michael's – since Bernie became him. Er… did I explain that right?"

Tony squeezed her hand on his upper arm. "Perfect, Abs. Selwyn could only tell me the body was in a side inlet, it was identified, no way to detect foul play on what was left of it. An accident, they called it."

_The old man laughed, but there wasn't much mirth in it. "It may have been… but when Rebecca saw her husband's will, I tell you, that was when I made mine!_

"_Maybe you ought to tell someone…"_

"_Oh, believe me, son, I'm not the only one who's raised an eyebrow… but the Sheriff's not going to go investigating rumours… not when there's already been an inquest. But if the coroner had asked us… well, anyway, he didn't. I just keep my head down, and build myself a road. She tried to stop that, but I'd already got permission from the State of Virginia. Nobody even thought about a will, just assumed she inherited as next of kin… it was only when she tried to throw me out of here and I produced my copy that all hell broke loose." He laughed wickedly again. "Hey… don't let me put you off your riding holiday though, she has damn all to do with the stables…"_

_He took a reflective pull of his weissbier. "Never could figure why she came back in the first place. Maybe she wasn't doing so well wherever it was she went when she left him, so she figured while his defences were down'd be a good time to come back. Whatever… don't let an old man's ramblings put you off. Thanks for helping an old feller out, Tony. You go over there and see if you fancy a holiday. If ya do, be sure to come back and have a beer with me."_

"_I'll do that, Selwyn."_

_Tony thought of hopping the fence, but decided not to risk getting off on the wrong foot, so he walked back along Selwyn's half built road as the evening shadows gathered, and in through the broad gateway. The ranch-style white wooden arch proclaimed 'Smith Mountain Equestrian Centre', and the hanging board beneath read, 'Proprietress: Rebecca Safin'. Hmm. So she didn't want to do the hard work, or even associate with smelly horses, but she sure wanted the kudos._

_A tiny car was leaving, and young Natalie gave him a cheery wave as she drove away. A rangy, strong looking dark haired man emerged from a loose box carrying a water bucket, and smiled pleasantly enough as he saw Tony. "Hi!" He set the bucket down by a standpipe. "Jeremy Goodman. I run this place. Natalie told me you'd be calling, if you're Tony DelPiero, that is."_

"_That's me," Tony said, slipping into pleasant average-guy mode, and shaking hands. Goodman picked up the water bucket and set it by Warrior, who was standing, still saddled, by the paddock fence. "That's the war-horse Natalie was riding… Warrior, right?"_

_Goodman seemed pleased that he'd noticed. "War-horse… yeah, you know that's about right. He'd look good with a knight in armour on board. I told Natalie I'd unsaddle him and rub him down, so she could get home. He'll be fine for a minute… would you like me to show you round?"_

"_Well, if it's not too much trouble… I mean, the idea never occurred to me until I got up to the top of that hill up there and saw the view. But what better way to look at it than on a horse?"_

"I was pretty sure he bought it. No… I was certain he did. My gun and badge were locked in the glovebox in the car; I had my back-up, but I didn't think anyone was going to go looking up my trouser-leg. He showed me the horses, which were mostly in their boxes for the night, except for a few that liked to live out. He showed me the immaculate indoor riding school, the tack room, the trophy room… it was an excellent set-up. He didn't hurry me – he was proud of it all. He even told me that _as yet _they had no accommodation, but mentioned a good relationship with the hotel down the road."

He sighed. "If Rebecca Safin had been content with that, nobody would ever have been any the wiser; that flagged up will would have been forgotten… nobody mentioned it when MWWRB died…"

"MWWRB?" Tim asked.

"Michael Who Was Really Bernie," Gibbs caught on. "Tony's into acronyms at the moment."

"Why –"

"Don't ask."

"I had no idea why everything changed. I saw car headlights, the Mercedes coming onto the yard, and I braced myself to be nice to the lovely Mrs. S. Jeremy said have a good look round, excused himself, and went to talk to the boss."

"Who'd been talking to Jeremy's cousin, the now ex-Deputy Sheriff. Who knew a fed was coming down to look at the will, because Tom Wallis had no idea he should _not_ let the Sheriff know about it."

"So the next thing I know is, I'm leaning on the fence by the empty paddock, peering across at the horses in the far one, and wondering what horses did when they were wild, and had nobody to put their rugs on at night… I hear hooves on the concrete behind me… and it's Warrior, with Jeremy on board, heading straight for me."

_He should never have given Goodman the idea of a knight on a war-horse, Tony thought, as the big horse's charge knocked him into the gateway, and the momentum took him into the paddock. A man on the ground is at a disadvantage when his opponent is a skilled rider, on a horse whose colour means he can't easily be seen in the darkness… and who instead of a lance, is wielding a chunk of four-by-two timber like a club._

_He scrambled to his feet, and tried to work out where the gateway was, as Goodman turned the horse, and charged again. The makeshift club whacked his arm; the rider's boot made contact with his ribs, and he ended up on his knees. The big horse was alarmed at the rough treatment he was getting, and was snorting and squealing in protest; the sound of his hooves striking the ground was like thunder, and in the background Rebecca Safin was screaming instructions to the rider. Tony's head was spinning with the effort to orientate himself, as Goodman took Warrior as far away as possible to get a clearer run. _

_Tony jumped to the side; it was clear that however much the rider tried to force him, the horse didn't want to collide with the man on foot; he thought he remembered something in Rudyard Kipling's writings about horses on the battlefield being unwilling to step on the fallen, and told himself this was no time to debate the matter. He tried to reach down for his back-up gun, but the attack was renewed, and this time the big horse stamped on his foot as he went by. Tony crumpled in pain; there were sparks behind his eyelids, for all that the agony was coming from the furthest extremity from his head, so that when the black horse came back, he had no defence. Warrior, however, gathered himself and leapt over him, to the surprise and rage of his rider, who found himself unexpectedly on the ground himself._

_Attack was the best form of defence, and Tony hadn't forgotten the club, so he dragged himself to his feet and threw himself bodily at Jeremy Goodman, while the black horse ran to the other end of the paddock and stood there shaking. As the two men wrestled and rolled, Tony tried to prise the hunk of wood from his opponent's hand, and finally managed it, but only by luck, as they rolled over again and it was trapped under him at such a painful angle for his wrist that he had to let go. _

_Tony grabbed it and used it to push himself upright; although with a foot he could hardly stand on, he hadn't many options. Once again he tried to reach down for his back-up gun, but now it was Goodman who charged. The Federal Agent was carried backwards out through the gateway; something clanged and moved behind him as he hit it, and he felt a scrape along his arm and a pain in his back even worse than the one in his foot. _

_Wha-a-at…He collapsed again, and this time there was no getting up. The wheelbarrow he'd been pushed into lay upturned beside him; the pitchfork that had been in it clattered down as gravity dragged one tine out of his back. The other was still under his arm. Oh, wonderful, DiNozzo… only you…_

For a moment or two they were all silent as Tony paused in his narrative. "It wasn't a knife, then… Oh my God, a _pitchfork_," Abby finally said in horror."Tony… are you up to date on your tetanus jabs?"

He grinned and rubbed his head against her shoulder. "Mm… I'd have got it by now if I wasn't…" he said softly, grateful for the light relief after the intensity of his tale.

"That was it… I couldn't move, or speak, so I played dead. I heard her ask if I was, and he said no. She said damn, to leave my car where it was; she'd seen me visiting Selwyn, and they'd deny all knowledge of my coming to the stable afterwards. I really hoped they wouldn't be able to wash my blood out of the concrete, and I hoped that Jeremy wouldn't realise Natalie had seen me. I felt a bit worried about her… what they'd do if she said she _had_. The lovely Rebecca told him to put me in the trunk of his car, and drive me far away, up into the mountains. You remember I recalled something about bears, Boss? She said hopefully if anyone ever found me they'd blame it on them."

Nobody spoke, so he went on.

_He steeled himself for the drop into the trunk – it was going to hurt – and it did. The sparks were back behind his eyelids, and although the pain in his foot had subsided to a nasty throb, the one in his back reared up every time he moved. And he was going to have to move, he knew, if he had any hope of getting out of the situation he'd got himself into. Well, he wasn't in a body bag playing dead for his friends at the FBI, he could move, and he had a plan. If his body would let him carry it out._

_Jeremy had taken his gun, although he didn't know about the belt-buckle knife, and it was those two things that set Tony's mind racing. He didn't pin any hopes on Goodman knowing enough about forensic science __**not**__ to risk leaving a bullet somewhere in his body, so he might very well shoot him to make sure…that's if he was still alive anyway by the time they got wherever they were going. Small mercies, as Ducky would say, he was lying on his left side, and his phone was in his right hip pocket. He wasn't getting his hopes up… reception was notoriously bad in the mountains, and he'd probably smashed it during the fight…_

_He was half right… there was power, and even a bar, but the keypad wouldn't work. He tried not to care, since he'd expected it anyway, but with limited success. OK, next… extract knife… not too painful, but getting his belt off was going to be much worse; when it was done he lay still for a while, just waiting for it to stop… please, just stop… _

_As soon as he could, he fiddled around in the dark for something to attach the belt to on the underside of the trunk lid. Two smallish holes… he had no idea what they were for, but they'd do. It was easy to pass the belt up through one, and much harder to get it to come back down through the other, and he was almost crying by the time he finished, but he wouldn't stop until he did. _

_The lower loop was easy; the jack was stored in its slot, held in place by a screw with a loop at the top for a handle. Great. Another small mercy. He passed the belt through, and then knotted it, as without the complete belt buckle it wouldn't fasten that way. Knotting a leather strip wasn't easy, and it wouldn't hold for long, but for now the trunk couldn't be opened from outside. Once again, he rested._

'_DiNozzo!' The boss's voice was sharp in his mind. 'You may __**think **__you have time to rest, but what if he stops in the next five minutes?"_

'_On it,Boss'… and if he got out of this alive that's one part of the story he wouldn't tell Gibbs… He turned his attention to the back seats of the Ford. _

_The first time he'd been locked in a trunk was at Ohio State, and he'd got out by using a tyre iron to bend one of the back seat locking devices. Just as well, because Emily Clark, who was locked in there with him, was starting to hyperventilate… He'd learned over the years that some cars were easy, some difficult, and some impossible. And with this one came the added problem of not letting Jeremy Goodman know he was doing it. He knew people don't usually look in their rear-view mirrors nearly as often as they should; he hoped Jeremy was usual people. _

_He lay back, limp with exhaustion, a smile of triumph on his face; his knife was now firmly wedged in the catch; all he needed to do was pull on it at the right time, and the double seat would fall forwards, leaving him enough space to move quickly. Now all he had to do was wait, and then… oh, yeah, move quickly._

"When he pulled up, I'd lost track of time… the last stretch had been over an unpaved road – not too bad, but not fun either."

Gibbs looked at him. How bad did things have to be for DiNozzo to admit they weren't perfect?

"He switched the lights off, I guess he didn't want all the hundreds of people who were clearly up in that deserted spot to see what he was doing…He left the engine running, which was also good because it might muffle the sound of what I was doing. It didn't muffle the sound of him cocking the gun though…"

"You were right, then," Ziva said. Was it just his defensiveness, or did she really sound surprised?

Gibbs saw the small frown above the bridge of his SFA's nose. "You all right? Want us to go? We can hear the rest tomorrow."

"Nah, Boss… we're nearly there. Just want to amaze you with my ingenuity."

_As soon as he heard the driver's door open he acted. The seat was pushed down, and he was out before Goodman got to the rear of the car. His knife skittered away into the tyre well somewhere, and he forced himself not to look for it. No… not his knife…He was counting on the man not looking inside the vehicle, being intent on dealing with the prisoner in the trunk. He heard him swear, as the trunk catch popped but it still wouldn't open. He pulled the rear door catch as his captor wrestled with the trunk, and as it sprang open, he hoped the blind spot it made would be enough to shield him for a moment. He shot out of the rear door faster than anything but adrenalin could have moved him. _

_There was a shout from behind him, and he expected to at least hear a shot, even if he didn't __**feel**__ one, and assuming that the man would fire straight ahead if he couldn't actually see him, which was correct, he dived off to the right. As he left the track and even ground, his injured foot gave way. He found himself on a steep slope, covered by scrubby bracken and low brush, bumping and slithering downwards, until the ground gave way altogether and he fell a few feet, landing with a bump and a groan. He continued to roll on downwards, he had no idea how far in the darkness, until a levelling of the ground and a larger bush stopped his progress. _

_He lay on his back, listening to the sorry tale of pain that his body was telling him. He whimpered softly, and drifted for a while; he hadn't an ounce of energy left to move. After a while, somewhere high above, he heard an engine being gunned, and saw the lights of the Ford again. He curled up beneath the bush; it was unlikely that the beams could penetrate this far down, but he'd take no chances. He listened as the engine sound faded away into the night, and stared up at the sky. A few stars; no moon, barely enough light to see the shape of the bush, not enough to see even a few yards in front of him. But he wasn't staying here…_

_He pushed himself to his feet. Easy… he straightened up, let out a full throated yell of pain, and fell again. His last conscious thought was, 'Hope the bears didn't hear that…'_

**AN: Happy Birthday , Sarahsrr…**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: Not really a chapter for Ziva fans… mind, I think they all stopped reading my stuff long ago.**

**A couple of friends asked about Emily Clark…**

All the Other Acronyms

Chapter 6

Tony paused in his narrative, looking at his knees, embarrassed at admitting his weakness. Nobody moved or spoke; he wasn't sure if anyone was breathing, and he didn't feel any kind of condemnation. They really did care. For a moment, he felt overwhelmed. Abby's hand, softly rubbing up and down his left upper arm kept him grounded. From somewhere, deep down he knew not where, he raised a smile, and looked up again.

"My watch survived," he said, brightly. "I was glad I slept through the night, because it was really cold when I woke up. I'd never have got to sleep otherwise," he added cheerfully, glossing over that he'd just told them his method of getting to sleep. "I hate going to bed cold… It was almost 6am, and the pain was much less. I thought I'd best get moving, so I stood up and took a look round."

_His teeth were rattling, and his abused body was stiff, and it took maybe five or six minutes of grunting and fighting off dizzy spells before he stood upright. There was a road up there somewhere that he had to get to… He tried to recall exactly where he'd seen the car headlights last night, they'd seemed quite a long way above – and then the heart that had been lifted by a working watch and reduced pain, sank again. He recalled the moment when the ground gave way and he fell what he thought was a few feet; the escarpment was a good twelve feet high – he was glad he hadn't known that before – and it ran as far as he could see in both directions._

"_The glass is half __**full**__," he said out loud. "It's going to be so much easier to go down than it would have been to go up." He sniggered, knowing what the others would think of him talking to himself, and took a very tentative step onto his left foot. Whoa… could be better. "Could be worse. Come on."_

"I kind of liked the really steep bits, I could sit, and go down on my ass. Or sometimes, when I missed my footing, I just rolled…"

"But if you were already on your ass, Tony, how could you miss your footing?" Ziva asked sweetly.

"Oh… I just did sometimes."

Gibbs sighed inwardly. Think before you speak, Ziver… No way would DiNozzo ever _admit_ to repeatedly passing out. "We traced your phone," he said neutrally. "One of the Rangers was nearer than we were… went in on horseback and found it." He remembered the bleak disappointment in the pit of his stomach when the woman had called in: no-one there. "Did you know you'd dropped it?"

Tony smiled a little. "Oh, yeah, Boss. That was the spot where it changed from two bars to one, and I thought that if it went to none, McGee wouldn't be able to track it at all, so I left it there. At least you'd have some idea of where I'd _been._" He paused, then gave Tim a slow sideways glance from under his lashes. "I'm only going to say this once, McBoyscout, but it's in front of witnesses. I wish I'd listened a bit more to your words of wisdom on the great outdoors…"

Tim was silent for a moment, then smiled. "You'd think I could be tempted to a little moment of smugness," he said, "but it's just not happening for me right now. Maybe later?"

"Let me know. I remembered you should look for a stream, and follow it down… I went down maybe four hills only to find nothing at the bottom. I either had to go round them or climb them again." Nobody commented on the effort that must have taken, but they all thought it. "In the end I found one – stream, I mean, not hill… by falling in it."

_At least he wasn't cold any more… the sun was rising higher, and anyway, his exertions over the last – he peered at his watch, wondering why it was so difficult to focus on it – two hours, had brought his temperature back up again. No… three hours… where __**had**__ the time gone? He was sitting down, and he couldn't remember when he'd done that. He'd been walking. Well, hobbling…_

_Ahead of him, down and to the west was a stand of trees; he didn't know how high up you had to be to get above the tree line, but clearly he was coming to it.( Or would be if he moved.) That had to be good. He pushed himself to his feet, aware of a stab of pain in his right arm, took a few lurching steps, and then one into nowhere. His foot kept on going down, and the next thing he knew he was on his hands and knees in water._

_How had he not __**heard **__it? It had to have been right there under his nose as he rested. Or spaced out. Or whatever… He squeaked and gasped and spluttered at the coldness of it, although he had to admit it cleared his mind. He knelt in the water with his shoulders and arms on the bank, and rested his head on the grass for a while, before telling himself he'd been there for long enough. The cold was numbing his foot, which was nice, but it was numbing the rest of him too._

_He walked downstream until he found a place where the bank fell away, and climbed out. Now he was cold again, and he hoped for another of those small mercies. If he could stay in the sunshine he'd probably be fine… if he went into the shadow of the trees, he'd never get dry. He cupped his hands and drank some water from the stream, then stood up and lurched on his way. His stomach growled, but hell, there wasn't a thing he could do about that._

_After a short while, he had to stop yet again; the empty holster where his Glock had been was rubbing at his leg now that the leather was wet; so he bent, carefully, to remove it. No more sitting down, DiNozzo… although he was beginning to long for another good steep hill. His foot hurt. His arm ached. His back was beginning to throb more than he could ignore. His chest and ribs felt a bit bruised, and he tried not to extrapolate on that. He made to drop the holster, and then changed his mind. It might come in useful, although he couldn't think how. He wished again he'd taken a bit more notice of McFrontiersman._

"I'm not even thinking 'told you so'," Tim said. "But I know it _did_ come in useful."

Both Tony and Gibbs said "What?" at the same time.

"I found your crutch," Tim said, "outside the Ranger Station." Everyone looked at him for clarification. "I don't know when you had the idea, but it made it all the way down the mountain with you. Tony found a branch, Boss – right size to reach his armpit, with another piece at right-angles. He put the holster over it as padding. Ingenious."

"Necessity was definitely the mother of that idea," the SFA said reflectively. "Hey… it worked. Don't think I'd have got down the mountain without it. I don't suppose…"

"Yep, I brought it back."

"No kidding? McGee, _really_?"

"Yep… I've got it under my desk. I thought you might like to keep it." The two of them laughed uproariously while everyone else looked at them as if they were barking mad.

"I thought it might make a good defence if I met a bear," Tony finally managed to say. "Actually, it was no help at all with that…"

Tim stopped laughing abruptly. "You met a bear…" he said heavily.

"Oh yeah… but that was the next day…"

"Go on…"

"Well… I walked all day, I guess… except when I rested, which was lots. I couldn't move fast cuz of my foot, then when I found that branch, and stuck my holster on it, I sat on a rock and laughed until I had to headslap myself. The sun was starting to sink, any darker and I might have missed it, but I did move a bit faster after I made the crutch." He unleashed another DiNozzo grin. He was stuck with telling this tale, and no way was he going to whine. "OK, it took the pain from my foot a bit – a lot – started it off again in my back, but hey, those are the breaks…"

"Tony…" This time it was Gibbs who chided him quietly. He got the unspoken message. _'You don't have to pretend.' _Mmm… not the easiest time to stop doing what he'd done all his life.

"Well… when it got dark and I started bumping into trees, it was time to stop. If I'd seen the bear tooty _before_ I went to sleep, I'd have climbed a tree even if it killed me… but hey, it didn't matter if it was cold, nothing was going to keep me awake. I found a patch of dry undergrowth, burrowed in, tried not to think of the creepie-crawlies…"

"I never imagined you being afraid of insects, Tony."

Ziva again. She really didn't know when to give a guy a break.

Tony frowned, trying to find the words. "I didn't want… I couldn't wrap –"

"He didn't want them getting into his wounds, Ziva." Gibbs was matter-of-fact; although there was a hint of reproof in his tone, because someone with her background must have known that. "He had no way of keeping them out."

"Ew…" Abby said softly. She patted his shoulder. "Did you get to sleep?"

Tony's grin was back "Oh, yes. I started thinking about Emily Clark…"

"Oh, yes," the forensic scientist purred. "Your first experience of being locked in a trunk. Do tell…"

"Abs, we haven't time for this…"

"Sure we have, Boss. Not much to tell… Emily was a sweet little thing, but she wasn't sporty, she was… well, she was brainy and a geek. But she had a crush on me, and Mark Stookey had a crush on her… Well, I saw her coming one morning, and the only place I could think of to hide was in the trunk of this huge GMC that belonged to my pal Donnie. I dived in and pulled it almost down… the next thing I know is, it opens again, and Emily dives in. The trunk slams, and we're stuck. I say, 'Hi, Emily,' and she lets out a scream like a banshee.

"_Tony! What are you doing in here?"_

"_Hiding. What are __**you**__ doing in here?"_

"_Hiding. I hate small places. Get me out!"_

"_Emily, I'm stuck in here too!"_

"_Well, __**do **__something! Anyway, who were you hiding from? Tony? Tony? You were hiding from me, weren't you! You beast…" _

"She started punching me and screeching, and when I could find them I grabbed her wrists, and said, 'Yeah, like you were hiding from Mark Stookey.' Easy to figure really. She saw the irony of the situation, and stopped. But she was still scared, and she started to cry, and her breathing was so bad I thought she might be asthmatic. So… like I said, I got us out with a tyre iron. Heroic, resourceful.

"When we got out, we saw Mark hovering nearby; she took one look at his guilty face and realised who'd shut her in. She went straight for him, not a word of thanks to me, and I thought she was going to kill him… but it's 'Oh, Mark… do you love me that much? Oh, that's so sweet…' and off they go in a little cloud of pink petal geek love! Excuse me? Who rescued her?" He pouted, but he was still laughing as he continued his tale without missing a beat.

"Well, I woke up even stiffer, and even colder than the day before, and boy, was I hungry. I thought I must be feeling better, cuz I hardly thought about food all the previous day. I sat up, kinda creakily…" he paused for effect, "and then I saw the bear poo not six feet from where I was."

"_Algy met a bear,_

_The bear met Algy,_

_The bear grew bulgy,_

_The bulge was Algy…" _

_He sang the song over and over as he staggered downwards alongside the stream, and after a while he began to giggle. He stopped and stood still to calm himself down, standing on one leg and leaning on his trusty crutch. His friend, TC… It was another sunny day, and he was getting warm. Too warm? The throbbing in his back was like an aircraft engine, and he was light-headed. He drank some water from the stream and kept going, but he kept stumbling, and if it hadn't been for TC, he'd have fallen repeatedly._

_He saw something ahead, and stopped, trying to focus his eyes. A thin line of trampled earth… and a marker post. A marker post! A trail, a real trail, with walkers, and rangers, and… he heard McGee's voice. "Trail posts have directional arrows, and miles, to the nearest Ranger Stations…" He tottered up to the post and collapsed, reaching up to touch the weathered wood as if he feared it would disappear again. He squinted at the numbers. Two miles. He could do that… of course he could… he used the post to climb back to his feet, turned in the direction the arrow indicated, and stopped dead again. _

_Right in the middle of the trail, a black bear sat scratching itself._

_Tony froze. He had absolutely no idea what to do. Running was out. Talk to it? Nice Teddy… He'd heard people say you should play dead, but that seemed as good as saying, 'Here you are, bear, free lunch'. He clung to his faithful TC, and willed himself not to fall down. After what seemed like an eternity, the bear stood up, belched loudly, set off at a lope down the wooded hill at right angles to the trail, and soon disappeared, although Tony could still hear its progress for a while afterwards._

They all heard a slight sound from by the door. Nurse Danielle stood there, eyes wide.

"Oh," Abby exclaimed. We said we'd be gone. But –"

Danielle shook herself. "Bears," she muttered. "It's fine, I've talked to Dr. Blamire. I explained what had happened, and he's coming down, but he said this was as good a treatment as any, and you could rest later." They all looked at her in mute gratitude. Tim stood up from his chair, and invited her to sit. "Thanks. So what happened then?"

"Well… I made my legs take me to where he'd been, and there were smashed up remains of a honeycomb lying by the trail. Seems like I got the best fed bear on the mountain." He paused and grinned at Tim. "I know you'll tell me they don't attack humans very often, McNaturalist, I just didn't want to test the theory. I couldn't have fought off a squirrel just then!

"I'd been so darn happy to find that trail, I told myself I could do two miles no bother, but being elated one minute and scared rigid the next… I _mean_, the bear didn't even look at me… I wondered if I was suffering from shock, maybe, cuz I felt terrible…"

_He didn't look up, or ahead; he didn't want to peer into the distance and see no sign of his target. He didn't look for a one mile marker; he simply looked at the trodden brown earth under his feet, to keep him on the trail. It was only when the path began to climb that he looked despairingly up; and the station was maybe fifty yards away._

He leaned against Abby and sighed blissfully with relief now his tale was told. "I know you found me before Goodman did, Boss; Dr. Blamire told me. What don't I know? Did you get her?"

"You really asking? Goodman came back, took the car to the top of a cliff, put it in drive and let it run itself into the lake. With your Glock on board, and your blood. But… when we'd spoken to the same people you did, we figured what you'd figured… it was just a matter of picking them up. He came to us by going after you. Tip off from the same Deputy… we should have arrested him earlier. Haven't got to the bottom of who killed who yet, but they're both as bad as each other. Apparently _she_ saw a photo of him in a local paper, promoting the stables, realised it was Bernie and saw a better meal ticket than the one she had."

"She told us that stampeding horses wasn't enough to kill Michael, so Bernie and Goodman both beat him with fence posts, beyond recognition. Bernie told her that, so she had Jeremy in her pocket as well. Nice." Tim grimaced as he filed in that bit of detail.

"Goodman denied everything," Gibbs said softly. "Said there was no evidence… but would you believe this… when we arrested him at the Ranger Station, he was wearing _your _belt, with your knife, and your blood on it."

"It took Gibbs about two seconds to spot it," McGee added. "I thought for a minute he'd kill him."

"Glad you didn't, Boss. I loved that knife… "

"I took it back to the place I bought it," Gibbs said. "Having it reground, and a new belt. Be as good as new."

"You trusted me to remember… you knew I'd want it again."

"Sure I did…"

Danielle stood up. "Tony, you should rest." Everyone agreed, and stood up, except for Abby, who tried. Tony seized her hand.

"Abs, wait…" She didn't argue.

After all the goodbyes had been said, she murmured, "Did you see that?"

"See what?"

"Timmy lingering behind to wait for Nurse Danielle?"

"McGee… and Danni? No kidding…" He was silent for a moment. "Abbs… I'm sorry I hurt you…"

"Sssh. You didn't. Not really. Not when Tim explained. Not when I thought how you must have been feeling." Her voice wobbled a little. "You see…"

She broke off and wriggled out from under him, re-plumped his pillows, and pressed the remote control to lower the bed, then sat on the bedside chair to bring her face to the level of his. "You see… all I could think about was, well, what if you never remembered? What if you were never my big, brothery friend again? What if that happened and we couldn't rebuild as a new family? What if the fact that we always knew what you didn't, and said 'remember when', and you didn't, made you angry? And hurt? So much that you had to go somewhere far away to start again?"

"But Abbs, I didn't…" the green eyes were anxious even though sleep was trying to close them.

"No, but what if you had? I could only think of how _I'd_ feel… What if you were out there somewhere in the world, and maybe not able to find anything as good as you'd had here… because it _is_ good, Tony…"

"You hear me saying any different, Abbs?"

"Nooo… but what if you were out there, never really happy again, and still I couldn't see you, or talk to you, or ever make things better? I couldn't have borne that, Tony!"

He took her hand. "I thought about it," he said truthfully. "Before I remembered… I thought maybe I'd have to go… but d'you know… because I do… that something would always have brought me back… to Gibbs… to the team… to you, my Abby…" He slept.

**AN: Done. Some one-shot. Tell me what you thought, she begged needily.**


End file.
